Daniel 1:1-21 [+/-]Daniel 1 [1:1]In the third year of the reign of Jehoiakim king of Judah, Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon came to Jerusalem and besieged it. [2]And the Lord gave Jehoiakim king of Judah into his hand, with some of the vessels of the house of God. And he brought them to the land of Shinar, to the house of his god, and placed the vessels in the treasury of his god. [3]Then the king commanded Ashpenaz, his chief eunuch, to bring some of the people of Israel, both of the royal family and of the nobility, [4]youths without blemish, of good appearance and skillful in all wisdom, endowed with knowledge, understanding learning, and competent to stand in the king's palace, and to teach them the literature and language of the Chaldeans. [5]The king assigned them a daily portion of the food that the king ate, and of the wine that he drank. They were to be educated for three years, and at the end of that time they were to stand before the king. [6]Among these were Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah of the tribe of Judah. [7]And the chief of the eunuchs gave them names: Daniel he called Belteshazzar, Hananiah he called Shadrach, Mishael he called Meshach, and Azariah he called Abednego. [8]But Daniel resolved that he would not defile himself with the king's food, or with the wine that he drank. Therefore he asked the chief of the eunuchs to allow him not to defile himself. [9]And God gave Daniel favor and compassion in the sight of the chief of the eunuchs, [10]and the chief of the eunuchs said to Daniel, "I fear my lord the king, who assigned your food and your drink; for why should he see that you were in worse condition than the youths who are of your own age? So you would endanger my head with the king." [11]Then Daniel said to the steward whom the chief of the eunuchs had assigned over Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah, [12]"Test your servants for ten days; let us be given vegetables to eat and water to drink. [13]Then let our appearance and the appearance of the youths who eat the king's food be observed by you, and deal with your servants according to what you see." [14]So he listened to them in this matter, and tested them for ten days. [15]At the end of ten days it was seen that they were better in appearance and fatter in flesh than all the youths who ate the king's food. [16]So the steward took away their food and the wine they were to drink, and gave them vegetables. [17]As for these four youths, God gave them learning and skill in all literature and wisdom, and Daniel had understanding in all visions and dreams. [18]At the end of the time, when the king had commanded that they should be brought in, the chief of the eunuchs brought them in before Nebuchadnezzar. [19]And the king spoke with them, and among all of them none was found like Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah. Therefore they stood before the king. [20]And in every matter of wisdom and understanding about which the king inquired of them, he found them ten times better than all the magicians and enchanters that were in all his kingdom. [21]And Daniel was there until the first year of King Cyrus. (ESV)

I. Some Clean up Issues

A. First, Remember that the approach that I am taking to Daniel and the companion Apocalyptic in the New Testament is the approach of HISTORICAL PREMILLENAILLISM. This means first that the historical context becomes the primary environment for understanding the future so that we interpret what is to be “analogously” by what is given us in the context of the history. Second, this approach means that the church goes through at least some of the Tribulation period if not all so that this approach would not hold to a rapture of the church prior to the Tribulation. Third, this approach sees Israel in a two-fold way: on the one side Israel is an important entity as geo-political-national entity. In other words, the existence of the state of Israel is important to the purposes of God in the end time.

This does not mean, however, that all who are in the state of Israel will be saved in the end nor does it mean that all who are ethnically Israel will be saved. Israel is thus defined in two ways: on the one side is the State of Israel composed of those who belong to God and those who do not and on the other side is the Israel of God or all who have been brought into a relationship with God through His grace by way of the gift of salvation which comes through Jesus Christ.

B. Second, your approach to Israel is a part of your understanding of the end times. And there are three approaches that have historically been taken:

1. All Israel refers to all Jews so that all Jews will be saved. This would mean that God has two ways of saving people. One is through Jesus and the other is by being Jewish.

2. All Israel refers to the church so that Israel is a code word for the people of God so that our approach to the state of Israel is defined by what is politically feasible and not by anything biblical since from this perspective this issue is not addressed in the Bible.

3. All Israel is used in two senses with one having to do with the State of Israel and the other with the saved who are the people of God or the New Israel. It is this last one that characterizes my approach to this issue.

C. Third, I want to try to clarify my concluding remark in our last session about the Roman Catholic Church. I recently had lunch with a man who is a Roman Catholic who loves Jesus and is devoted to Jesus. But as I told him, I have struggles with some of the beliefs of the church and the most important of those with which I struggle is the issue of how a person becomes right and is kept right with God. We believe that we are justified by grace through faith and we are kept in right relationship with God in the same way. In other words, God calls us into a relationship with Him and gives us what we need to commit our lives to Him so as to begin a life of living under the Lordship of Jesus and the evidence of God’s work in us is seen in our devotion driven by desire to become by God’s grace all that God wants us to be. This is not the teaching of the Roman Catholic Church.

The RCC teaches that we are set apart for God through baptism and that as an infant but we are justified before God through those things that we do in and through the church that make us right with God. And if we don’t do enough in this life then we can have those who will pray us through purgatory so as to have us finally arrive at the justified state and thus enter paradise. In other words, justification does not precede sanctification as the free gift of God but follows sanctification as the means by which we become right with God through the works that we do in this life or the works that are done for us after this life that will in time release us from purgatory into paradise. That view in my opinion is not what the Bible teaches and the Roman Catholics that I know who are born again believers do not hold that view even though they continue to be a part of a church that does.

That is what I meant by calling the RCC an apostate church. But let me be very quick to add that liberal Protestant churches are as apostate as are Roman Catholic Churches. So my agenda is not anti-RCC but desiring to measure the meaning of church by biblical standards.

II. The Historical Context, 1:1-3

A. What God had prophesied through His prophets was now coming to pass; Babylon was invading Jerusalem and taking both possessions and people. Both in the earliest phases were of the finest sort. They were not after everything at first; they wanted to paralyze the place and her people by taking away the very best. How would someone who wanted to take over country go about it if their first focus was the first among places and possessions and the finest among the people? How would you go about changing the immediate condition of the country and the course of the culture? Babylon was after both these realties.

III. How to Change the Course of a Culture, 1:4-7

I just finished reading the summer issue of The Southern Baptist Journal of Theology that chronicles the 150 year history of THE Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky. Reading about those horrific years of liberal leanings was so hard for me but it reminded me that in my short stint as a faculty member teaching Greek hearing faculty members talk about the goal of a three year program of study: the first year was about unlearning, the second was about new learning, and the third was about solidifying that new learning so as to send out students who were committed to the liberal/moderate agenda both in terms of the Bible and the Convention.

What we have in these verse is critical. They show us how Satan works to change the course of a culture. Pay close attention.

A. Target the youth, 4a. But not just any youth. Satan wants the brightest and the best. Look at the list of characteristics for the kind of children and youth for whom they were looking:

1. Morally decent or without blemish;

2. Good looking Guys;

3. Good discernment or skills in handling information

4. Knowing what education is and how to go about learning

5. Comfortable in the context of the palace and the university

B. Teach the Youth what you want them to know; Control the Curriculum so that you communicate what is true. Do you know that there is so much evidence for at least the teaching of Intelligent Design that is not allowed to be taught in many school systems? Why would we not allow this view to be taught since it undeniable that is scientifically viable? It is not allowed for the same reason that from a conservative perspective we do not want to teach that most of the founding fathers were deists and not men who were deeply devoted to God in the sense that you and I would understand what it means to be deeply devoted to God. But what do you teach the youth when you are wanting to change the course of your culture?

1. The literature that you want them to know; Here the reference is to history slanted to one perspective or literature written from one view only. Get your college reading list for your students and you will know what the angle is from which they are being taught.

2. The language that is the language of the culture. Language is the symbol carrying system of the culture. Culture has its lingua franca and its subcultural systems that is often found in the music of the subcultures.

3. The lifestyle of the culture. Teach them how to live by showing them what to eat and drink. Bring their taste for food and fine wine in to alignment with the language they are speaking and the books they are reading. It was no accident, for example, that in my early years of seminary when I was learning liberal theology that I also developed a taste for different foods and fine wines as well as wanting to learn to speak in a way that was not distinctively “southern.”

These are the three basic ways that Satan works in a culture to change the worldview of her people. And the place where this is prominent and paramount in our culture is on the campuses of our colleges and universities. You will not send a child to a public university and most private universities without them being radically changed unless they are really grounded in the Word of God before they go. Parents had better think seriously about this issue; there is where modern Babylon exists.

C. Take three years and then let the King determine whether or not they have arrived at degree status, 1:5. Seminary takes three years and a modern university without any breaks for summer would take about that amount of time.

IV. How to Remain Faithful to God in this kind of Context, 1:6-21

A. We must know who we are so that when someone tries to change our identity, we are clear about who we are regardless of what others say or do, 1:6-7 Daniel means, “God is my judge.” Hanniah means “The Lord is Gracious.” Mishael means, “who is what God is?” and Azariah, “The Lord is a helper.” Remember that names meant far more in that day than in ours; the name represented the essence of the identity of the person who bore the name. This is why the question of Moses to God in Exodus 3 [+/-]Exodus 3 [3:1]Now Moses was keeping the flock of his father-in- law, Jethro, the priest of Midian, and he led his flock to the west side of the wilderness and came to Horeb, the mountain of God. [2]And the angel of the LORD appeared to him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush. He looked, and behold, the bush was burning, yet it was not consumed. [3]And Moses said, "I will turn aside to see this great sight, why the bush is not burned." [4]When the LORD saw that he turned aside to see, God called to him out of the bush, "Moses, Moses!" And he said, "Here I am." [5]Then he said, "Do not come near; take your sandals off your feet, for the place on which you are standing is holy ground." [6]And he said, "I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob." And Moses hid his face, for he was afraid to look at God. [7]Then the LORD said, "I have surely seen the affliction of my people who are in Egypt and have heard their cry because of their taskmasters. I know their sufferings, [8]and I have come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up out of that land to a good and broad land, a land flowing with milk and honey, to the place of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites. [9]And now, behold, the cry of the people of Israel has come to me, and I have also seen the oppression with which the Egyptians oppress them. [10]Come, I will send you to Pharaoh that you may bring my people, the children of Israel, out of Egypt." [11]But Moses said to God, "Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the children of Israel out of Egypt?" [12]He said, "But I will be with you, and this shall be the sign for you, that I have sent you: when you have brought the people out of Egypt, you shall serve God on this mountain." [13]Then Moses said to God, "If I come to the people of Israel and say to them, 'The God of your fathers has sent me to you,' and they ask me, 'What is his name?' what shall I say to them?" [14]God said to Moses, "I AM WHO I AM." And he said, "Say this to the people of Israel, 'I AM has sent me to you.'" [15]God also said to Moses, "Say this to the people of Israel, 'The LORD, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has sent me to you.' This is my name forever, and thus I am to be remembered throughout all generations. [16]Go and gather the elders of Israel together and say to them, 'The LORD, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob, has appeared to me, saying, "I have observed you and what has been done to you in Egypt, [17]and I promise that I will bring you up out of the affliction of Egypt to the land of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites, a land flowing with milk and honey."' [18]And they will listen to your voice, and you and the elders of Israel shall go to the king of Egypt and say to him, 'The LORD, the God of the Hebrews, has met with us; and now, please let us go a three days' journey into the wilderness, that we may sacrifice to the LORD our God.' [19]But I know that the king of Egypt will not let you go unless compelled by a mighty hand. [20]So I will stretch out my hand and strike Egypt with all the wonders that I will do in it; after that he will let you go. [21]And I will give this people favor in the sight of the Egyptians; and when you go, you shall not go empty, [22]but each woman shall ask of her neighbor, and any woman who lives in her house, for silver and gold jewelry, and for clothing. You shall put them on your sons and on your daughters. So you shall plunder the Egyptians." (ESV)
is so very critical, “what is Your Name?” Their names were changed to Bayblonian names that invoked the Babylonian deities Marduk, Bel, and Nebo.

B. We must resolve to live in commitment to who we are as the people of God, 1:8. The idea here is not that found in our first of the year resolutions. The idea here is the kind of commitment that comes out of an awareness of our identity. It would be something like this, “Because by God’s grace and His tender mercy manifest in the sacrifice of His Son for my sins, I resolve to live in the following ways so as to represent well who my God is and what my God has done for me: and what would some of the ways be?

C. Note the connection between verses 8 and 9. God’s favor was granted to Daniel because of Daniel’s faithfulness to God. Let me emphasize yet again that this basic Biblical pattern is never altered. We experience God’s presence and power in direct relationship to our determination to be devoted particularly when that devotion can be costly. It was here. It always is.

D. We must trust God and do what He tells us to do in a way that bears a winsome witness to those who would will and want us to do otherwise. Notice how gracious Daniel is to the representative of Nebuchanezzar. He is not defiant about what he is going to do. He trusts His God and asks for grace from the Babylonian official, 1:9-16.

V. God’s gift to Daniel and His friends in this difficult situation, 1:17-21

A. God gave them what they needed to learn the language and the literature while giving Daniel skill through visions and dreams to see correctly what was coming at them, 1:17. When we are being inundated by our culture we must have someone in our lives that can help us sort it so as to see it for what it is.

B. God enabled these four to be the finest and the fullest of knowledge among all who had been brought to Babylon. Do not ever think that being Biblical in your understanding is a defection to being dumb. That is what our culture communicates. The serious and saturated study of God’s work will produce with brilliant insight into what is going on in the world. The Bible is the Book from the hand of the One who created everything that is. Why would we ever think that knowledge of a University Science text would make us smarter than knowledge of the Bible? You better know the answer to that question by now!!. In fact we are told that when they stood before the king, 19; they were ten times or totally and completely more intelligent than any who were in Babylon.

C. The final verse is a frame for the first verse which tells us when Daniel came and how long he stayed which was in fact the 70 years of captivity in Babylon. Daniel was an old man when he went back to Jerusalem; the bulk of his years were spent in foreign land as are the bulk of our years when we recognize who we really are and where home really is.

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